Gotcha
by Krivoklatsko
Summary: She's a light dancing with dark impulses and vain, unhappy thoughts. She sighs, closes her eyes, and one of them will grab her and whisper like it was their private joke, clever and unique. One thinks he's quick. One thinks he's strong. She knows better.
1. Chapter 1

**Little winds and waters slithered through an open window to sprinkle and cool the sill of Aqua's room. Content with sleep, she snuggled under her covers and danced in a dream, oblivious to the chilly morning of training that awaited her- and to the masked shadow that lingered by her side.**

**What little he felt through the gloves of his injustices was odd to him, new; skin without scars, silky-smooth hair, silent and undisturbed rest. There was work to be done on her heart- pain to be dug, anger to be planted, rage to be nurtured- all for the twin fruits of chaos and ruin. The trail of his finger across her chin lacked a certain lightness to it, and her eyes shot open.**

* * *

Aqua sat up into the cold, where a draft found her unsuspecting. The merciless chills were easily fended off with a hug, but left her still uncomfortable. The open window and uninvited drizzle caught her attention. In the shadows, meanwhile, the manifestation of her plaguing thoughts did not. Aqua slipped out from under her covers and skimmed across the room toward the window, trying to avoid the floor for fear of her bare feet freezing. She hadn't remembered leaving it open, and couldn't think of why she would. Her hand knocked the drapes aside to slide the pane shut, cutting the whispers of the world from their source. The wind only bothered the castle's exterior now.

But another sound troubled her. With a hand still on the sill, she cut her breathing, trying to listen below what she would otherwise hear. Groaning stones shifted under gusts. Swirling dust, propelled by equalizing temperatures, wisped from floor to roof. Somewhere in the castle, a rodent was scavenging. There was another noise, indistinguishable- too low perhaps, as if it were the sound of something merely being where it shouldn't be, of the air it displaced.

Aqua swiveled and summoned a keyblade to her side. Tiny sparks flew to life on her other hand, ready to sling a quick spell. But no threat presented itself. Aqua waited, considering. Her room was too dark, she decided.

She startled the curtains behind her to illuminate her room in natural intervals, sending spots and holes dancing like angered souls through the room. Her floor was clear- certainly enough for her to step into the center of the room, keyblade taught at her side with a shock spell still sparking between her forefinger and thumb. The moonlight freed up the front wall in a large sweep, signaling blessed safety and ease of mind. She turned her back to it and the door it held.

The moonlight's minimal effort skirted around the rest of her room past the area of her bed, leaving a solid of black floating in the miasma of grays. But where her eyes failed her, the rest of her senses were sure. It wasn't just a sound to her anymore. The feeling of eyes upon her quickened the beat in her chest. She was prey for something lurking in the nooks of her own room. Aqua steeled herself and shook a new spell to life on her fingertips.

"_light_," she casted away. A small orb sprung to life at the far end of her bed, just bright enough to illuminate a foot or so around itself. Aqua sighed at her still-blooming aptitude for magic.

_If that had grown in as fast as everything else, I wouldn't have this problem._

She chewed the inside of her mouth in thought, angry at her inability to effectively turn the tables on whatever phantom was with her. She could only stand in the dimness and hope it would give up its advantage.

She certainly wouldn't be giving up hers, but the impasse was terrifying. Every second she spent staring could have been right into its eyes.

"_wind_,"she whispered. The light scooted clumsily across floor, only moving a few feet, and failing to yield any information. Again, she could only curse.

The thought of calling for help struck her. Terra was in the same hallway as her, after all; and she doubted that they were out of Master Eraqus' detection. But then how would something get into the castle without him knowing? The obvious answer struck her disappointingly.

Aqua straightened out her back, realizing she'd been leaning over to peer.

"Alright, Terra," she mumbled. "Very funny. You can come out now."

Terra didn't answer, and she realized that- more than ever- she really wanted him to, regardless of where he was. She shifted her weight to step back, toward the door, but froze when her eyes suddenly adjusted to wake. Her light on the far end of the room was resting against an anomaly- a slight variation in the ring of light, as if the darkness had somehow intruded on it, but so slightly that it wasn't clear.

She could have been imagining it, or the spell could even have been failing. Either way, it was time to decide whether or not she would call for help. Disappointed, groggy eyes fed her cynical thoughts. She did _not_ want to be embarrassed in front of Terra- not for being too afraid to sleep alone in the dark.

No. Calling for help was definitely not an option. She wouldn't wake anyone up unless she needed to. It was time for _her_ to act. If she wanted to be a keyblade master, she was going to have to act like one first.

Aqua steeled herself again, reinforcing it with a fighting stance, and cleared her throat.

"Whoever you are-" She began. But her voice caught when her fears materialized. Her eyes suddenly focused on the abnormality in the light; and with them, her mind came to bear. The shadow in the light was the toe of a boot. It retracted, leaving her paralyzed.

She had to be wrong, she knew. It _had_ to be her imagination.

"Go on…" a voice cooed from the shadows.

She shook, reeling at the fear of a real combat for her life, but failed to answer.

"What's the matter?" the voice continued. "Cat got your tongue?"

Her loss of control let the spell on her hand spark her, startling her back into the action.

"_Thunder!_" she shrieked.

Bristles of electricity coalesced over the intruder's form in the blackness, giving away his position. Aqua lunged with her keyblade, swiping horizontally. She knew she wasn't the best in melee, but a keyblade gave her the advantage. It was made to hit things and hurt. To her horror, it did neither. She nearly cried out in shock as the blade zipped through her sparking target like wind. The intruder vanished- an illusion.

"Too slow," the voice smirked.

She felt her legs struck from under her as something grabbed her hair. She had cut it short for a reason. An expert twirling-knee-strike freed her. Her aggressor couldn't dodge without releasing her.

She stood again and took her stance on instinct, keyblade taught at her side and free hand ready with another contact spell. Another horror had greeted her by then. The enemy had disappeared like a Shinobi, back into the shadows.

Aqua returned to the center of her room, breathing low, ears high. Dancing shadows drew her gaze around the room jerkily, but the window curtain had settled for the most part, leaving her without light. She flicked another wind spell to send it dancing again. A stray moonbeam caught the intruder near the door. He lunged.

She panicked and blocked directly, not realizing her mistake until they locked. Blade grapples were not her forte, but it wasn't the unfavorable condition that chilled her so much as the realization that her opponent was wielding a keyblade as well, and significant armor. Hers was hanging in the dresser, leaving nothing but cloth to protect her. The intruder pushed her back, taking ground. Quivering knees stopped her from responding. She couldn't push back. More importantly, she couldn't let him back her against the wall.

A roll took her away to his side, back to the window- him chasing with strikes that she parried and dodged. Her next duck/dodge/handspring sent him thumping into the window with the committed weight of his last strike, momentarily disorienting him while she retook her stance near the door.

"_Thunder!_" she cried out again. Fizzling tickles skipped over his body in the shadows, bothering him less than she had hoped. The intruder chuckled.

"You're learning," he cooed. "But you rely too much on evasion. It won't do you much good out in the real world."

Aqua remade her stance, lower.

"You want me to slow down for you?" she teased.

He gestured at her from the darkness, ignoring the response. "And you really shouldn't let someone like me catch you without any armor on."

She tensed uncomfortably, quips failing her as the intruder gestured her window pane open.

"It leaves you… open," he slurred.

An unnatural wind accompanied his last word to violate the room and sweep through her clothing like hands where they shouldn't be. The chill slipped under her fabric, loosing shivers and a shriek. She hopped back to her fighting stance, embarrassed and terrified.

The armored figure scoffed. "Pathetic." The dim outline of his head shook. "Let's see how much damage you can take."

Aqua couldn't have hoped to handstand out of the ensuing flurry. With inhuman suddenness and horrid silence, the Shinobi descended on her as a swarm of blows. She couldn't have hoped to dodge; but she didn't needed to.

Thinking fast, she raised her arm and channeled what magic and imagination she had into a spontaneous spell. It broadened from the palm of her hand into a glowing sphere of hexagons, like a honeycomb barrier that shut out the world.

His thousand strikes were worthless as they met on a hex-based barrier, leaving Aqua unscathed and giggling from a combat high. She had never practiced a barrier spell before, and she had only ever seen octagonal forms. Necessity, it seemed, was the mother of invention after all.

The intruder grunted in approval as he recovered his balance, but the minor victory was short lived. What damage the barrier could take was far surpassed by his next strike. His blade sundered upon her in a two-handed grip, shattering the barrier. Air blasted in around her, muffing her ears as it collapsed and threw her to her back. Another haymaker came at her face, leaving a solid block as her only option. She raised her blade and stopped his only a foot from her face.

The featureless, armored face appeared above her and Aqua, flat-on-her-back, realized her third mistake of the night, and its finality. The aggressor had her in a blade grapple again, with her on the ground and no room to maneuver. His weight shifted down, burning her biceps as she tried to resist.

His voice was a vanity in itself, vainly cooing, "See what I mean? Run out of tricks and you're finished."

Aqua grunted and strained against him, trying to shift his force to either side, or to get her feet under her without letting his weight come down on her neck. It was impossible; she was pinned. And the realization was sinking in that she was at his mercy.

"I figured you weren't really keyblade material," he mused. "Got any more tricks before I kill you?"

The panicked plea in her eyes said no. Her options had suddenly become, "die a coward" or "die fighting." The cold, steel plate above her seemed to be mocking, or salivating over her soul.

"So there's _nothing_ to stop me from taking your life?" he mused.

In the strangeness of the respite from an assassin, she couldn't help but think it was a prompt- that he _wanted_ her to come up with another technique and turn the tables again. Exhausted abilities and luck loomed back at her until she caught her breath.

"Fine," he finally muttered. The weight against her tripled, unbearable, seizing up her heart and forcing her elbows to the floor. It was only a matter of time before he would choke her, she knew, and there was nothing she could do to stop him. The certainty of death loomed closer as her wrists weakened, as his knees landed on either side of her and the mask came down to her eyes.

"You are sooo _weak_," he moaned. The disappointment oozed from him, as if he were hoping for something more, like…

"TERRA! TERRAAA!"

Aqua thrashed and screamed with the last of her strength, buying seconds and deafening the assassin.

He only scoffed, annoyed. "Oh, you little cheater."

"TERRA, HELP!"

She screamed out the last of her air and thrashed with her legs, losing her coherency and thought. The assailant removed his weight and stepped away from her.

"TERRA!"

She had to gasp.

"THERE'S SOMEONE TRYING TO KILL ME!"

The masked figure stepped back into the moonlight, giving himself away to her eyes for the first time. His hands were covering his ears; it was the taunting gesture he wanted her to see.

"Shuuuut _up,_" moaned from his mask.

"TERRA!"

A door slammed somewhere distant in the hall, responding to the overt terror in her shrill. She scooted herself upright against the wall and grabbed the hilt of her blade with both hands, exerting enough force to lift its tip in the Shinobi's direction in case he decided on a coup de grace. Her arms were too ruined to lift it properly.

"Fine," he mumbled. "We'll do it your way." His own keyblade responded in her direction. "_Sleep_."

* * *

In the next instant, tucked properly and secure, she was snuggled in her bed as before. Little winds and waters had left her, as had the frosted floor. The moonbeams had settled their dispute with the curtains, leaving only the silhouette of an armored figure resting on her sill behind the drapes. She could barely acknowledge it through cracked-open eyes.

As the door to her room burst open, she saw less of the silhouette- only the fuzzy outline of a blob behind her curtains, and then the blob rolling away and disappearing into the night. And then Terra, brushing her hair aside. She heard him mutter, "Oh. You're asleep?"

And before she could respond, it was true.

* * *

Rings, swinging, wind-whistled for the marshes on the mountain. They were targets during the day, and instruments at night. Two visitors listened in for their amusement.

"Well?" Master Xehanort grumbled.

His apprentice presented himself with a kneel. "I wouldn't call her an equal. Her friends are her strength."

Master Xehanort scoffed with a scowl toward the castle. Fingers- his own- traced the path on his face of the scar on another. "I think we all know just how valuable friends are," he muttered.

His apprentice was occupied with his own thoughts, and interjected them. "Master."

"Mm?"

The apprentice- the Shinobi- lifted his head. "You were right about her. Her heart is… filled with light."

Master Xehanort rounded on his pupil. "I don't like the tone in your voice."

He bowed his head quickly. "I don't envy her, Master. I was just… curious."

His Master grunted. "I did not create you to be curious, Vanitas. You exist to give me the X-blade. Remember that."

Vanitas nodded, his head down. "Yes, master."

"Will she suffice if we need her?"

Again, Vanitas nodded. "We need to give _her_ more time, too. But yes. If the pipsqueak never recovers, she'll do."

The Master nodded, grinned, smiled. "Good."


	2. Chapter 2

"One motion. One strike."

Aqua leveled her blade at a hovering orb of light. One motion. One strike. It shattered. Another orb took its place. Aqua breathed- in like a blessing, out like a curse.

"One motion. Two strikes."

She leveled her keyblade against the new target. One motion and two strikes later, it shattered. Eraqus was silent and still at her side as she took her next breath, observing the rules. One breath. One motion. As many strikes as she could count to.

"One motion. Three strikes."

"Kiai," he deadpanned.

Aqua flinched at the surprise. "Master?"

"One motion. Three strikes. Kiai," he explained.

Aqua breathed- in like a blessing, out like a curse.

"One motion. Three strikes. Kiai," she confirmed.

She leveled her keyblade, both hands on, hilt at waist level, tip between her eyes. It wavered slightly under her novice handling. _Time and patience_ she remembered_. Focus on the now. _

She cleared her surroundings from her mind one strike at a time. First the tree had gone. The hill beneath her feet, and those in the distance, would be harder. For now, she forgot the sky. The target bobbed ahead of her, seemingly slower, now that there was one less thing to distract her.

She lunged. One strike across. Two up. Three, above her head, struck down with all of her girlish might.

"Kiai!" jumped from her throat.

What had felt sure in the process was proven lame by the result. The target bobbed in the air before her, unshattered. In the year of training she had almost completed, nothing had embarrassed her so much as this. Protocol being the comfort it was, she returned to her starting position. The target, a sphere of light, continued to bob. Eraqus, meanwhile, only watched.

"I- it." Aqua glanced over her shoulder to make sure that Terra was too busy with his own target to notice her failure. _Bad move._ She peeked at the Master apologetically. Seeing on his face what she feared, she retook her stance and addressed the target.

"One motion-"

"Aqua."

She tried not to scream an apology. "Master?"

With the patience of a man who handles children he said, "You have not destroyed the target yet. Take your foes one at a time."

Aqua glanced at him again. "It didn't break, Master."

"You did not break it."

Aqua bit her tongue, realizing the mistake she had made and hoping he wouldn't notice.

"And that will be an extra minute before supper," Eraqus chided. "'It _did not_ break.' Contractions are vulgar and unbecoming of a warrior."

"Yes, Master."

The orb bobbed, taunting her for every second that it was not broken. Aqua stepped forward and over-reached herself to harshly tap the target. It bobbed.

"Did I teach you to wield that way, Aqua?"

She cringed inwardly. Almost a year of training was falling apart in a single day. "No, Master."

Now in a proper stance, hilt at her waist and tip at her eyes, she faced the target formally. The tip wavered. She struck, formally, and with precision. The target shattered.

"Good. Now start again. One motion, one strike, Kiai."

Aqua resumed her place and addressed the target. _In like a blessing, out like a curse._

* * *

Terra addressed his target for the one-hundred and thirty-second time. Two hundred was the magic number if he couldn't break it. He focused his aim on a natural crack formed by ice, and then waited. The strike would come when it was ready, and his target wasn't going anywhere in the mean time. Waiting was the worst part. Waiting killed him like no other temptation could. The crack was there, almost a quarter of an inch wide, begging to be sundered. He could take it at any moment.

_Or it could take you,_ the Master's voice echoed in his mind.

Terra sighed and lashed out at the rock in front of him, missing the crack by an unacceptable margin. With any other weapon, the exercise would have been sacrilege- like reading a book to a fire- but the day a keyblade broke was a good day to go find another life entirely. When the reverberating pain in his arms subsided, Terra readdressed his target. _One-hundred thirty-four._ Terra waited, eying the rock with the utmost content. What it lacked in mobility, it made up for in station.

Terra had to admit, though, the rock did have patience. He chanced a glance at Aqua, and did not envy her the scrutiny of the Master. The rock grabbed his attention again when he realized that it had scored yet another victory of focus. Terra cleared his mind of everything but the crack, and the satisfying thought of it widening under his next blow… as soon as the strike was ready.

* * *

"One motion. Thirty two strikes. Kiai."

Aqua lunged and felt her lungs begin burning immediately. The exercise, she decided, was ridiculous, without any conceivable function. Her arms were fermenting, feeling weak in the same places as the night before. She couldn't afford the oxygen to think about it, and tried focusing on the bobbing orb in front of her instead.

She was on her twelfth strike and beginning to falter. It wasn't clear to her whether the target was bobbing or holding still in a bobbing world. Who the Hearts had invented this workout? The mountain under her was swirling under her now in directions it didn't usually take. On her twentieth strike, she lost the count and felt as if it had seized her instead. Twenty-two and Nineteen stared her down. She continued, picking the bigger one. _It has to be twenty-tw_o, she thought. Twenty five faltered against the target and sent her rebounding backwards, off balance. Embarrassing un-fluid steps led her back in line to keep fighting.

Swaying, the target waited. She hated it. The target had to die. She felt that same hatred as the night before. Burning coals fueled what oxygen had deprived now. She wouldn't be weak. Not twice in one day. Her keyblade slashed against the target, crunching on it one strike, slicing through on the next, counting down to a victory she couldn't let go of.

Her knee fell to the ground under her, reminding her of the grass she was on. The mountain below her swirled. With five strokes left… _three?_- she didn't know anymore. She couldn't tell whether she was standing still in a tilting world, or falling in a static one.

Clarity struck as her check compressed against something hard

her hand fell against a boot. A cold wind was blowing against her face from the windowsill in her room. The shadows chilled the air around her even more. But the boot only stayed, burning her with anger like the target had presented, like the shinobi from the night before.

Her hand tightened around the boot, feeling it- him, the intruder to her room- standing over her again, ready to kill.

"Pathetic," he cooed.

Aqua gasped. Her eyes refocused on the hill around her. Standing over her was Master Eraqus, neutral to her plight. She continued gasping for air, trying to block the bobbing target out of her mind. The Shinobi took its place, striking when she was distracted and retreating into the shadows of her mind whenever she tried to evict him.

Her breath was returning, finally. The feeling returned to her body with it as nerves came back to life. She was lying on her back. Eraqus, still patient, was waiting for her. Pounding footsteps stopped just short of her, and Terra's face appeared.

"Aqua!"

The feeling of death returned. This time the flavor was embarrassment.

Master Eraqus understood the feeling when she covered her face. "Enough for today," he declared. "Terra, fetch me some water."

* * *

Terra placed a plate before his master and bowed. The dining room was decorated with an ornate table, at which Aqua and Master Eraqus were already seated, napkins in their laps. Terra had seen to it that traditional rice cuisines were cooked, and Aqua had seen to it that the table was properly set and embellished, and Eraqus was happily seeing to it that they saw to it.

"Domburi with chicken, Master," Terra announced.

Eraqus smiled and nodded. "Thank you, terra. Please, have a seat." He gestured to his right hand side, opposite Aqua. When terra had properly placed his napkin and straightened his back, Master Eraqus nodded and turned to Aqua. She was sitting on the edge of her seat, one knee over the other.

"Would you be so kind as to set the timer for ten minutes, Aqua?"

She nodded to the master, trying to hold back the happiest smile of her life. She had only earned three minutes today, which meant that she wouldn't be the last to eat. Terra was not so fortunate. When the dial was properly placed, and the device was returned to the spice wheel at the center of the table, Master Eraqus lifted his first bite. Aqua and terra stared into each other's eyes, meanwhile, expressionless. Or Terra was expressionless. Aqua only hoped that the glorious satisfaction in her wasn't spilling over to hurt him.

Master Eraqus moaned softly. "I have instructed you well in the kitchen, Terra," he chimed.

Terra kept his expressionless resolve through his tone. "Thank you, Master."

Dinner proceeded as usual, in strict discipline. Terra was responsible for cleaning dishes along with cooking them. Aqua procedurally tended to the table's decorations. Tomorrow, they would switch.

* * *

When Aqua was finally relieved of her duties for the day, she treaded to her room. The sun had set long ago, and would rise too soon. She closed her door behind her, placed a small star-shaped charm against her window, and climbed into bed with her shoulder-guard still on. She stayed on her side, eyes fixed on the darkness, feeling the phantom breath of the shinobi against her exposed skin. The image of his mask would flash at her every time she blinked, reminding her that that was impossible. And yet the feeling remained. She lashed out in a sudden fear that the feeling was not an illusion at all, but the darkness around her did not respond.

Hours later, when exhaustion finally overcame her, she dreamt only of fighting him again, of every trick, of every mistake. And when he was confident that she was asleep, his shadow slipped from a corner, quietly set the star-charm flat, and leapt out of her window into the night. And so Aqua slept, nightly searching her room and tossing in her sheets, never without her armor or her enemy and admirer, and completely unaware.


End file.
